The picturesque hill station of Auli in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand is battling the aftereffects of a grand Indian wedding. Weeklong celebrations have turned the town into a dump yard with forty quintal (4,000 kilograms) of garbage. The town is paying the price for wedding grandeur worth Rs 200 crore. After the wedding celebrations […]
Uttarakhand
Amid accelerated Himalayan ice loss, a wedding celebration
Ice loss is occurring at a rapid pace as the Himalayas have been melting at double the rate since the turn of the century, a new study has revealed in another warning signal for India’s climate change crisis. The American Association of Advancement of Science study, titled “Acceleration of ice loss across the Himalayas over […]
AIIMS Rishikesh in controversy over HIV misdiagnosis
The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Rishikesh, Uttarakhand has found itself at the centre of controversy after it falsely diagnosed a patient with HIV. The consumer forum in Haridwar imposed a fine of Rs 60,000 on the institute following a complaint lodged by Naseem Ali in January 2015. The previous year, Ali […]
Unpaid dues could cost patients dialysis
Two Uttarakhand clinics providing free treatment for kidney disease face the loss of their dialysis machines – leaving patients in the lurch. NephroPlus, a kidney care chain, has said it will cancel dialysis services for two clinics in the state effective from March 23rd. This is unless past due payments totalling Rs 6.5 crore (US$947,152) […]
Strikes beset Indian hospitals
Doctors’ strikes in multiple Indian states are hitting public and private hospitals alike. A strike by private doctors in Uttarakhand is forcing many patients to turn to government hospitals for treatment. The week-long strike has resulted in public health facilities becoming overburdened by a sudden spike in demand. The issue has come to the attention […]
Are swine flu cases being misreported?
Swine flu has killed seventeen people in Uttarakhand state capital Dehradun, out of 81 cases reported. At least, that’s if you ask the health department. There are questions being raised over these figures. The Sant Mahant Indiresh Hospital (SMIH) alone witnessed fifteen deaths and 81 cases between January 1st and February 4th. The disparity between […]
Uttarakhand makes vaccination a must for schoolchildren
Immunisation rates in Uttarakhand fell by more than thirty percentage points in two years. Now the state is using stringent measures to drive immunisation rates upwards. Immunisation rates in the state fell to just 61.32 percent of children aged nine to eleven months in 2017-18. This was down from 99.3 percent coverage in the 2015-16 […]
How an anaesthetist’s absence plunged hospital into chaos
When Dr Hema Saxena took four days’ leave for Diwali, it plunged the hospital where she works into chaos. Dr Saxena is the sole anaesthetist at the Government Doon Medical College in Dehradun, Uttarakhand. In Dr Saxena’s absence, the hospital registered a backlog of more than a hundred surgeries. Patients were left waiting for days, […]